Two Canadian boats arrive in Duluth

On Sunday night, June 5th, 2011, the Atlantic Erie (above) came under the Duluth Aerial Lift Bridge and made her turn up the Duluth inner harbor to the Midwest Energy Resources coal dock in Superior. She is loading 30,000 tons of coal for Belledune, New Brunswick, a port on the Atlantic Ocean. She is about to pass the Algoma Navigator, (below), formerly known as the Canadian Navigator. She actually arrived 11 minutes earlier. The Navigator was on her way to Burlington Northern in Superior to load iron ore pellets.

Recently, Algoma Central purchased the fleet of the Upper Lakes Group Inc. Most of those boats have been renamed, as with the Navigator. To my knowledge, this is the first trip to the Twin Ports by one of their new vessels that has the new name on the boat.

Yes it is definitely a salt water port. But, salinity levels are sometimes lower than ocean levels. The St.Lawrence River, Saguenay River and other tributaries feed a lot of fresh water into the Gulf seasonally, while the Atlantic Ocean feeds salt water in continually. Mixing of salt and fresh is inconsistent, and such ports as Belledune, at the mouth of the Restigouche River do have fresh water and salt water layers.
Also becaue it is a Gulf and not the Ocean, some Great Lakes ships are permitted to sail there without meeting the same structural requirements than insurers and classificiation societies would demand for ocean trips.

Wow and thanks; it never occurred to me that the regulations about sailing in a gulf might be different that for the ocean, or fresh water. Thanks for the great information and for the original correction. Wikipedia defines a gulf as: A Gulf in geography is a large bay that is an arm of an ocean or sea.

The Port of Belledune, New Brunswick is actually on the Gulf of St.Lawrence, at the entrance to Chaleur Bay (Baie des Chaleurs) It is not on the Atlantic Ocean.
The port has an excellent website for those interested:http://www.portofbelledune.ca